British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca said the head of its China operations has been detained as the company faces investigations into potentially illegal data collection and drug importation.
Leon Wang, president of AstraZeneca China, "has been detained," a member of the group's communications department said.
"If requested, we will fully cooperate with the Chinese authorities," the group said on November 5, a day when the group's share price fell more than 8 percent, according to analysts, due to Chinese press reports about the investigation.
"We continue to deliver our life-changing medicines to patients in China, and our operations are ongoing," the company added.
AstraZeneca confirmed last month that Wang was under investigation.
China is a key market for the pharmaceutical company, which was developing the Covid-19 vaccine that was widely used around the world during the coronavirus pandemic.
In September, the company confirmed that several of its employees were under investigation in China after reports emerged that they were being questioned about potentially illegal data collection and drug importation.
According to the Bloomberg Economic Information Agency, the investigations conducted by authorities in Shenzhen (South China) concerned five people of Chinese nationality, some of whom still work for the group.
One of the investigations involved the collection of patient data, with authorities suspecting a violation of Chinese data protection laws, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Another investigation involves the possible import of a liver cancer drug that is not approved in mainland China, the news agency reported.
AstraZeneca, headquartered in Cambridge, United Kingdom, employs 90,000 people worldwide.
In recent years, some multinationals have reported an increasingly difficult business environment in China, with concerns including a lack of transparency over privacy laws and lengthy detentions of employees. | BGNES
